Juneteenth and the Business of Food Freedom

Juneteenth offers us the opportunity to reflect on stories, resources, and accessibility within the food & beverage industry. Understand the role food played in Black emancipation, and how businesses are carrying on that legacy in San Diego.

Every year, Juneteenth arrives with cookouts, red drinks, and community. Traditions around the holiday point to the deeper history underneath the celebration, one that includes a legacy of Black entrepreneurship in food.

Here are some things to remember on this day that commemorates the long and ongoing process of liberation in the United States.

A Brief History of Juneteenth

When enslaved people were emancipated, land was the first act of freedom. After emancipation, the great majority of newly freed Texas slaves scattered from plantations in search of somewhere they could call their own. Between 1865 and 1930, African Americans accumulated land and founded 557 historic Black settlements across Texas alone. In these freedom colonies, formerly enslaved people settled on pockets of land deemed too poor for farming and turned them into successful family farms, creating a refuge from the discrimination and violence that routinely constrained Black life in the Jim Crow South. They grew food, fed each other, and built an economy that didn't require anyone else's permission.

Some of that same drive pushed people west. Between the 1890s and 1910, large groups of Black Americans migrated to Los Angeles from Texas, Shreveport, New Orleans, and Atlanta to escape racial violence and find better access to wealth. They settled around Central Avenue in neighborhoods like Watts, building a community whose prosperity was still unusual among Black Americans at the time. Numerous eateries, music venues, and nightclubs stretched along Central Avenue from the 1920s to the early 1960s, making it the cultural heartbeat of what many called West Coast Harlem.

In San Diego, the Black community has helped shape the city's culinary, artistic, and entrepreneurial spirit across generations. It’s a legacy that continues today in the soul food kitchens of Southeastern San Diego, the food trucks working Imperial Avenue, and the pop-ups finding their footing across the county.

In the Civil Rights era, the churches, Black-owned newspapers, and civic organizations established in the early years provided support to newly arriving African Americans. The kitchen was always part of that infrastructure. The pitmaster, the vendor, the caterer working out of a church kitchen: they weren't just feeding people, they were holding the line.

What Gets in the Way

Access to resources, visibility, and material support has never been neutral. Black food entrepreneurs have faced, and continue to face, outsized barriers at every stage due to political and socialized prejudices.

Access to capital is the most obvious. Studies consistently show that Black-owned businesses are less likely to receive small business loans, receive smaller amounts when they do, and are charged higher interest rates. Many founders bootstrap entirely or rely on community financing because traditional funding routes were never designed with them in mind.

But capital is only part of it. The networks that grease the wheels of small business. The introductions, the mentorships, the rooms where decisions get made have historically been harder to enter. Shelf space in retail is a negotiation most emerging founders aren't equipped for without guidance.

And yet, every Juneteenth, there are Black-owned food and beverage brands thriving. Not because the system made it easy, but because they found ways around, through, and despite it.

Reflections as a Member of the Food & Beverage Industry

Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021. Since then, it's shown up on brand calendars everywhere: social posts, limited edition packaging, "in honor of" email blasts from companies with no meaningful relationship to Black communities or Black founders.

The food and beverage industry is not exempt from this. Performative allyship in food looks like featuring a Black chef for a week in June. Meaningful support looks like sourcing from Black-owned distributors, investing in Black-led accelerators, and building platforms that amplify emerging founders year-round.

For those building culturally rooted brands, the question isn't just how do we celebrate Juneteenth. It encourages us to ask, what do we stand for the other 364 days?

Who's Building it Here

In San Diego, Black founders are actively building food and beverage businesses rooted in culture, family, and community.

Bowlegged BBQ (Chollas View) is a Black family-owned operation run by three siblings: a sister on the line, a brother handling business, and the third brother, known as Bowlegged, whose name the whole place carries. Many of their children work there too. It's a multigenerational business built around recipes, relationships, and a room full of regulars.

SIP Wine & Beer was created by Cassandra Schaeg as a space to connect and share after a long day. Beyond her restaurant, Schaeg created the PBS series Fresh Glass, which highlights other BIPOC food and beverage entrepreneurs.

Yohed Coffee (City Heights) is a family-owned coffee shop specializing in Ethiopian-style beverages, a quieter anchor in one of San Diego's most diverse and underserved neighborhoods.

Altipiano Vineyard and Winery (Escondido) is home to San Diego's only Black female winemaker, Denise Clark, who co-owns and operates the vineyard with her husband, producing award-winning wines.

Maya's Cookies has become America's number one Black-owned gourmet vegan cookie company. A San Diego-born brand that scaled nationally without losing its roots. 

This is a partial list. San Diego's Black-owned food and beverage ecosystem spans BBQ joints, Ethiopian and Somali restaurants, Jamaican spots, breweries, juice bars, cocktail lounges, and more spread across neighborhoods from Encanto to Oceanside to Lemon Grove. Let us know your favorites in the comments.